This is a personal blog updated regularly by Dr. Daniel Reed, Vice President for Research and Economic Development at the University of Iowa.
These musing on the current and future state of technology, scientific research and innovation are my own and don’t necessarily represent the University of Iowa's positions, strategies or opinions.

May 17, 2010

Modeling the World

Today, Microsoft publicly launched a new technical computing vision, Modeling the World. In addition to the Modeling the World web site and a message from Bob Muglia, President, Microsoft Server and Tools Business, there is also a Facebook page, a Twitter account (@modelingtw), and a Vimeo page. The web site contains vignettes about computing from a variety of technical computing leaders, both inside Microsoft and across the broader community. There's even a snippet where I explain what attracted me to computing and computational science.

The core areas of the Microsoft technical computing vision are:

Technical computing to the cloud

Simplify parallel development

Develop powerful new technical computing tools and applications

Powerful tools, flexible toolkits and ease of use, these are the enablers of innovation. These are the key messages I have been emphasizing for a long time, namely the importance of democratizing access to technical computing by focusing on discovery and innovation rather than infrastructure. It is also why my colleagues and I have been engaging the research community on client plus cloud technical computing tools, as exemplified by the Microsoft/National Science Foundation partnership.

I am very excited about this future and what it means for the technical computing community.